With global collaboration and a flat world in mind, this group of Adobe Education Leaders (primary through post secondary education) is sharing their expertise and thoughts on the use of technology in the school classroom and at districts and college/university campuses around the world.

Archive for January, 2013

Now the current trend of Web development with HTML5 is very popular. But if you want to develop a web site with HTML5, it is not difficult anymore since Adobe Dreamweaver CS5 has additional functions to support HTML5 by the following settings

1. Go to menu Edit > Preferences

2. Choose New Document, and then set the value in the Default Document Type (DTD) to HTML5

3. Then click OK

That’s all we need to do to create a new file for website using Dreamweaver CS5. When we insert a table, a web item or whatever, it will be in line with the standards of HTML5.

This is inspirational. Watch developer Jesse Warden build out a game in 12 hours using Flash Professional, Audition, Fireworks, Photoshop, and Sublime Text. He is using the Corona SDK for development targeting mobile.

It’s great to see that the Creative Suite workflow is applicable even when targeting something non-Adobe like Corona! The big take-away though is what can be accomplished in such a short amount of time. I’ve learned much from short game jams and such – students can gain lots of experience across applications doing the same. Game development is a great way to teach workflow and get students familiar with the tools and platforms.

I built a Memory game (like Simon Says) in Corona SDK in 12 hours over Memorial Day weekend, recorded it, and compressed it to 7 minutes here. I used Adobe Flash, Fireworks, and Photoshop to do the artwork, Audition to do the audio, and Sublime Text 2 to code the Lua in with Ansca Mobile’s Corona SDK. I use Tower to check the code into Github.

If you want to get involved immediately – join the One Game A Month initiative! You don’t have to make anything complex… just hone your skills by building simple concept games. That’s what I’m doing. I know there are a few other AELs who have joined #1GAM / #OneGameAMonth as well – be heard in the comments and tell everyone how useful an effort like this is!

I am creating files in InDesign to be published to the iPad (teaching a class on it, iPad Publishing.) Everything has been working great and I have been really impressed with the students works. All the dynamic components really add to the file- like hyperlinks, audio, video, pan & zoom, panorama…. BUT the one dynamic content piece I can not get to work are buttons! I can hyperlink and link buttons to go to URL’s but I can not get them to work when linking to another file within the same folio. I have tried all the different options in the Buttons and Forms panels but nothing works (for example: Go to Destination, Go to State…) I am also previewing the file at the top level of the folio and even when the file is published to Adobe Viewer it is still not working. Does anyone know of an update or technique that I am missing to link to other files within the same folio?

Kanchan Chellani, currently a math teacher at New Milford High School, is a strong believer in making the learning process fun, interactive, and meaningful for students. To engage students in her classroom, Mrs. Chellani has utilized a variety of tools to help her develop an interactive, student-centered learning environment. Through the use of technology, collaborative learning exercises, and teaching mathematical concepts in the real-world and interdisciplinary context, she has managed to successfully work towards creating this desired positive and energetic blended learning environment. Some of the many methods Mrs. Chellani has employed in her daily instruction include integrating Smart Board interactive review games and videos to reinforce prior learning, case studies performed in the computer lab so students understand the significance of the material taught, and team assignments to foster a collaborative working environment.

Since the “flipped” approach to instruction is proving to be a key asset in modern education, one of Mrs. Chellani’s recent initiatives has been to provide students with a means to learn independently utilizing digital content. Starting in December 2011, she began using Edmodo, an online platform that enables innovative and social learning, as a way to share online videos and content on the relevant topic for her students to view and assign online polls to complete in order to foster discussion on the topic the next day. Although enabling the “flipped” approach to instruction using Edmodo has transformed the way material is taught and comprehended by students, it has been difficult to find resources that combine curriculum delivery, real-world examples, and assessments in a cohesive manner. As a result, she has started to create her own online learning modules, using the software Adobe Captivate.

Adobe Captivate is a highly, user-friendly digital content creation software that fosters interactive eLearning content. Mrs. Chellani has made use of the tool by creating learning modules that teach the basic mathematical concepts, as well as, provide practice problems, real-world examples, and assessments that allow for better comprehension of the material in an organized fashion. In these learning modules, instruction is provided using digital content, simulations, videos, screen captures, voice-overs, etc. to meet the visual, auditory, and tactile needs of the diverse student population. Once the instruction has been provided, guided practice problems and real-world examples are then discussed to reinforce the learning of the mathematical concept and to illustrate its’ significance. A variety of prompts and formal assessments are also embedded within the project in order to ensure that the learning has taken place, to develop higher-order thinking skills, and to facilitate discussion in the classroom.

Students view the instructional portion of the video (both mathematical content and real-world applications) and complete guided practice problems, prompts, and formal assessments embedded within the video.

Students come into class the next day with a solid foundation on the mathematical topic. The teacher utilizes the aforementioned prompts to facilitate class discussion and assigns polls via Edmodo to ensure that the learning has taken place.

Using Adobe Captivate, Mrs. Chellani has been able to create an engaging and interactive learning experience for her students that not only helps them understand complex mathematical concepts, but also helps them understand the real-world significance of those concepts.

With so many of us working on collaborative projects like the Gamified Curriculum Delivery System that Mike Skocko’s Mega Students of the Mac Lab developed, many of us are looking at getting a more global presence with our course materials. Others of us just lose every sheet of paper that hits our desks (myself a prime example) and want to eliminate paper from the classroom and have the curriculum available 24 hours to our students. For many of us, WordPress has proven itself a great solution. In fact, here at the educationleaders blog, we’re running a wordpress back end also.

WordPress is amazing. Take a look at this list of benefits:

It’s free, So it fits a teacher’s budget

It’s easy, so we have time to focus on content rather than the construction of our sites

It’s scalable, so we can ramp it up to a school wide or even district wide enterprise

It’s popular, so there’s a TON of help, lots of free plugins (add features) and themes (the layout and look)

What’s been missing is a great plugin that does all the classroomy, traditional stuff that we’re used to… traditional assessments for pre- and post-tests, monitoring of student access to the site, gradebook incorporated online, etc. I used to run a moodle install alongside my WordPress install for assessment and tracking of student work, but I found it cumbersome to have to manage 2 sites that acted like one.

A screenshot of my class site running on WordPress with Skocko’s Plugins

Finally, there’s a solution that is looking pretty good and it’s exiting beta soon. Don’t have details on prices yet, but it may be a great all-in-one solution for the classroom. I’m mainly looking for something that can track the users and provide pre-and post tests to help find where the kids are not completely comfortable with the content yet… I use tests not to see where the kids failed, but where I’ve failed the kids. If everyone’s missing a certain question, then it’s feedback to me that I haven’t covered this concept well enough yet or they’re still not comfortable with the terminology (and let’s face it… our industry LOVES it’s terminology and acronyms!).

I’ve been keeping an eye on this LMS plugin to replace my missing moodle functionality. I really want an online gradebook so that the kids can monitor themselves… Whether it’s self-reported (easy to do with a test) or actual, traditional testing and assessment, this plugin seems to fit the bill without sideloading moodle in my sites.

LearnDash is the plugin and the plugin’s author, Justin, has been very helpful and responsive- which is great for a plugin that is running your classes! Don’t have to worry about no support at all (which is common with wordpress plugs… you get what you pay for.) I encourage you to sign up for his newsletter and grab a copy when it’s time to test out on your wordpress site for class.

And if you HAVEN’T yet set up yourself with a wordpress blog for class yet… what are you waiting for? Even signing up with a free wordpress.com blog is a great way to get started in sharing your content with other educators across the globe.

And don’t forget to cross post your stuff at the Adobe Ed Exchange!!! It gives you great visibility to teachers that might not find your site elsewhere… but posting to your own blog ensures that all your students and parents can access your classroom resources easily.

Keep your eyes open for a series of blog posts here on setting up wordpress for your classroom and helpful plugins, themes, and tips for keeping it innovative and awesome!

e -training is the training process via electronic media. The process presents skill training and knowledge gaining, which focuses on the training and self-study. Participants are free to attend according to their available learning time, opportunities as needed. The content is designed to provide knowledge in multimedia, including the text, images, or sounds and animation. In preparation of e-Training system, there are many tools to assist in the design and development phase. But there is one tool that helps designers develop e-Training is easily and quickly. This tool is a program called Adobe Captivate. It allows the creation of teaching materials and interactive multimedia content. To begin using this software, select the Software Simulation to start the project.

Then set the size of the screen and select the Recording Type recommend.

Training: Use the training mode when you want the user to try the procedure during the movie. The movie moves to the next slide only after the user has performed the previous action correctlyAssessment: Use the assessment mode when you want to test how well the user has understood a procedure. You can set a score for every correct click. You can also set the number of times the user can attempt a procedure. When the user fails to click the right option in the number of attempts provided, the movie moves to the next step. The user does not get any score for the failed attempt.

This is a simple procedure that will be creating E-training system for use in teaching or to your work.

I announced a few days back on my personal blog that I am speaking on Edge Animate at Adobe MAX this year. Also included in that post is a quick, 30-second video ad for the session. For those who are unaware, Adobe actually solicits these videos from speakers as part of the speaker tasks and have done so for at least three years now. It is an optional task and I’ve never bothered to build one out in previous years but thought it might be fun to actually do it this time.

I prepared for a lengthy process of planning, recording, editing, compositing, and all the turmoil that normally comes with a project like this. I figured that I might be able to get it done in 3 or 4 days. Using Photoshop, Premiere Pro, Audition, and After Effects… I was able to do it all in less than 2 hours.

Integrate the After Effects composition, VO and BG tracks, and add company branding

The first thing I needed to do was build the core of the ad, which is based upon the Edge Animate logo. I basically plopped the logo in the center of the screen and then had it scale smoothly from far away up until the frame was entirely filled. Upon filling the frame, I employed a glow and burn effect to remove the logo and reveal the session information. Finally, I added some fractal background animation upon a solid fill behind everything whose colors were sampled from the Edge Animate logo. This composition is dynamically linked to Premiere Pro so I didn’t even have to render it!

In Audition, I set about recording the voiceover track and performing some mastering upon it so I wouldn’t have to fiddle with it at all in Premiere Pro. I’ve never had a good time playing with audio in Premiere Pro directly. Incidentally, Jason Levine has an excellent video tutorial on using Audition to generate broadcast-safe audio tracks.

The final step is to glue it all together in Premiere Pro. The After Effects comp was already present via the excellent dynamic link functionality present in the Creative Suite video production apps but I wanted to add the logo for my company, Fractured Vision Media, LLC, to the tail. It’s also simple to throw in some dissolves so that it all flows nicely. All I needed to do then was drop in the two audio tracks and trim the background to the length of the sequence. Done.

The result is included below. It took barely two hours to create and get up on YouTube and I think it gets the message across quite well. Cannot imagine doing this in any other toolset so quickly!

When viewing the video tutorial on the makeup, you will see that making slimmer face requires many makeup items. It is a complex process. The next step in helping to make slimmer face is to start using Photoshop.

1. Open the image file that you want to edit.

2. After opening the image file, before starting image editing, duplicate the Layer in order to copy the picture.

3. Delete the original file, to prevent confusion by dragging picture to the trash.

4. Then adjust the size of the face by selecting the Filter menu and select the menu Liquify.

5. You can select the size of the brush head for easy operation.

6. Use the brush head to adjust the size of the face, and as you gradually adjust, you must verify that the size of face looks appropriate. When finished, click OK.

In the process of parenting two kids and growing as an Adobe Education Leader each new year, I realize I have a responsibility as a dad to help my own kids grow into the 21st century. It has been comforting for me and for them to come home after school, telling me with excitement about what they have been learning in their internet safety program at school. I bring up with them about naming files and organizing their assets with computer folders. They tell me about learning about this already. I have moments of feeling humbled and surprised by how much they are learning at school. I decided as a dad to get involved from the beginning, teaching them computer literacy skills. The idea is for my kids not to notice that dad has now just shown up in their technology world. I don’t want them to have this experience of a sudden jolt of dad looking over their shoulder. I have decided to sit down with my kids once a week, becoming a guide and coach for them, having them identify with me as a helper. I have introduced and working with both of my kids on these programs and skills:

My vision and hope is by teaching them basic and more advanced skills of Digital Photography, Video, Asset Management, Emailing and Texting, Online Presentation and Website Development is that when it is age appropriate for them to have their own mobile devices and have access to social networks that they will be leaders amongst their peers, helping educate others what is safe and appropriate, and becoming very skilled for their own future.